# What is the name of this driving cautionary tale movie from the 50's-60s?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [November 4, 2009, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283 "2009-11-04T15:26:18Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@handsomeharry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handsomeharry)
#### Post date: [November 4, 2009, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/1 "2009-11-04T15:26:18Z")
I saw this movie in jr. high school in the 70s.
I think it had Richard Carlson in it, but I can’t remember. He was killed in a car wreck, and his ghost was at the hospital while his family was there, victims of the same wreck. He was being really, really melodramatic, (of course, he had just died, so I can forgive him). At any rate, the ghost was re-living?? the events that led up to the wreck, and the wreck was caused because 2 old ladies were doing something like 20 mph on a highway, he tried to pass them, and bingo.
SPOILER ALERT:
At the end, his son dies, and I can’t remember much else.
Can anybody help me with the title?
Thanks,
hh
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [November 4, 2009, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/2 "2009-11-04T16:07:43Z")
No idea - the driving cautionary tale we got was _Red Asphalt III_. Brains on the road look a lot like Cheetos, did you know? (And driver’s ed was right before lunch.)
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### Author:  [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)
#### Post date: [November 4, 2009, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/3 "2009-11-04T16:46:28Z")
“Hi, I’m Troy McClure. You might remember me from such driver’s-ed films as _Alice’s Adventures Through the Windshield Glass_ and _The Decapitation of Larry Leadfoot._”
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [November 4, 2009, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/4 "2009-11-04T17:13:33Z")
Wikipedia tells me that they’ve since made several more _Red Asphalt_ movies, presumably to keep things current for those hip and happening kids. The latest one was 2006. I mean, really? Is the old one really no longer serviceable? (I bet they’re still showing the third one at my alma mater, possibly from a projector.)
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### Author:  [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)
#### Post date: [November 4, 2009, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/5 "2009-11-04T17:46:46Z")
> [@Zsofia](#):
>
> The latest one was 2006. I mean, really? Is the old one really no longer serviceable?
It’s hard to resonate with a modern audience when one of your cautionary dramatizations involves a rear-end collision where an unbelted passenger flies through the windshield and into the struck car, being fatally impaled on one of its tailfins.
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [November 4, 2009, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/6 "2009-11-04T19:51:51Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#):
>
> It’s hard to resonate with a modern audience when one of your cautionary dramatizations involves a rear-end collision where an unbelted passenger flies through the windshield and into the struck car, being fatally impaled on one of its tailfins.
The one I saw was made in 1989, which was hardly the Stone Age. 🙂
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### Author:  [@SunSandSuffering](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SunSandSuffering)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2009, 9:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/7 "2009-11-05T09:17:55Z")
“Here’s an appealing fellow – they’re a-peeling him from the tarmac!”
(Beavis & Butthead I think)
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### Author:  [@C.Montgomery\_Burns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C.Montgomery_Burns)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2009, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/8 "2009-11-05T12:31:00Z")
> [@SunSandSuffering](#):
>
> “Here’s an appealing fellow – they’re a-peeling him from the tarmac!”
>
> (Beavis & Butthead I think)
No, that was Troy McClure. You may remember him from such educational films as “Lead Paint- Delicious But Deadly” and “Here Comes The Metric System!”.
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### Author:  [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2009, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/9 "2009-11-05T16:11:50Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#):
>
> It’s hard to resonate with a modern audience when one of your cautionary dramatizations involves a rear-end collision where an unbelted passenger flies through the windshield and into the struck car, being fatally impaled on one of its tailfins.
Plus, today’s whippersnappers are too easily distracted as they mock the clothes and hairstyles of Fifties-era road fatalities.
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### Author:  [@SunSandSuffering](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SunSandSuffering)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2009, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/10 "2009-11-05T16:23:28Z")
> [@C.Montgomery\_Burns](#):
>
> No, that was Troy McClure. You may remember him from such educational films as “Lead Paint- Delicious But Deadly” and “Here Comes The Metric System!”.
Oops, my bad :o
It seems I was thinking of Beavis & Butthead #80 “[Safe Driving](http://video.yahoo.com/watch/4591144/12289213)”.
Butthead: “Woah, his brain fell out.”
Beavis: “This is your brain. This is your brain on the street. Any Questions?”
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### Author:  [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2009, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/11 "2009-11-05T20:53:16Z")
This all reminds me of the time in 1984 when the State Patrol parked a totaled car in front of my high school with signs indicating it was the result of drunk driving. A few of us were standing around looking at it, and one of the guys said, “If there’s a Maxell tape in this car and it doesn’t work, we’ll replace it.”
Today’s kids just wouldn’t get the reference.
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### Author:  [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2009, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/12 "2009-11-05T21:47:53Z")
Our cautionary film was [Last Date](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0250489/), starring a young [Dick York](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0948685/).
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### Author:  [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)
#### Post date: [November 6, 2009, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/13 "2009-11-06T00:11:34Z")
> [@Zsofia](#):
>
> Wikipedia tells me that they’ve since made several more _Red Asphalt_ movies, presumably to keep things current for those hip and happening kids. The latest one was 2006. I mean, really? Is the old one really no longer serviceable? (I bet they’re still showing the third one at my alma mater, possibly from a projector.)
A projector!!! You’re OLD!
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### Author:  [@Labdad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labdad)
#### Post date: [November 6, 2009, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/14 "2009-11-06T14:48:08Z")
I’m _really_ old. Our movie was the classic [**“Signal 30”**](http://www.spike.com/video/signal-30/2776527). The color close-ups of the mangled car-wreck victims were known to induce nausea in some members of the class, and one girl actually passed out while viewing it!
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [November 6, 2009, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/15 "2009-11-06T17:30:00Z")
> [@Shirley\_Ujest](#):
>
> A projector!!! You’re OLD!
I’m not old - the projector was!
Okay, maybe I’m getting old too. But I’ll never be as old as the projector was.
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### Author:  [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)
#### Post date: [November 6, 2009, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/16 "2009-11-06T17:56:38Z")
In my Ohio HS, we didn’t go more than a week without seeing yet another driving safety movie produced by the Ohio Highway Patrol. When I got to school, a guy from Connecticut said all his movies were the same ones. Apparently there was a Cecil B. DeMille wannabe under one of those Smokey hats.
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### Author:  [@Wheeljack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheeljack)
#### Post date: [November 6, 2009, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/17 "2009-11-06T19:51:14Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#):
>
> Plus, today’s whippersnappers are too easily distracted as they mock the clothes and hairstyles of Fifties-era road fatalities.
I think this is it, in a nutshell. My class certainly was.
In addition, the picture quality was so bad on some of those old films that you couldn’t tell exactly what it was that you were looking at, ruining the effect. Could be people, could be upholstery, who knows?
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### Author:  [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)
#### Post date: [November 6, 2009, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/18 "2009-11-06T20:45:20Z")
Remember how on some of the films they used to show the color had gone off, so the people were all purple? Aaah, underfunded school systems.
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### Author:  [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)
#### Post date: [November 9, 2009, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/19 "2009-11-09T01:47:32Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#):
>
> In my Ohio HS, we didn’t go more than a week without seeing yet another driving safety movie produced by the Ohio Highway Patrol. When I got to school, a guy from Connecticut said all his movies were the same ones. Apparently there was a Cecil B. DeMille wannabe under one of those Smokey hats.
When I was in Driver’s Ed here in Kansas(early 1970’s) all our cautionary films were from the Ohio State Patrol! I remember one guy getting up to leave and he passed out before he could get away.
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### Author:  [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)
#### Post date: [November 9, 2009, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-name-of-this-driving-cautionary-tale-movie-from-the-50s-60s/516283/20 "2009-11-09T07:28:06Z")
I had never seen any of those drivers’ ed. movies until I was student teaching at a private school. All of the school had to watch the film at the same time. The young man seated in front of me also stood up and then passed out. I’m assuming that most of the highway patrol films show similar things – the results of real accidents.
In general, the development of the human brain is such that it is not fully able to conceive of the meaning of its own death until the person is approximately 16. Films like this can be particularly tough on 9th and 10th graders. (They are not easy on anyone.)
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